Hello and welcome to Inside Briefing, the podcast from the Institute for Government.

I'm Bronwyn Maddox.

Well, Freedom Day has been and gone, but the pandemic is a long way from being over. So as cases rise

and the pace of vaccinations falls, is the government right to have pushed on to stage four

of its roadmap? We're going to look at the decisions the Prime Minister has taken and the ones

he may yet have to take, as well as the ongoing assault by Dominic Cummings on his record

and judgment. We'll then dive into a subject which is all over the front pages just a few weeks ago,

but that feels like a very long time ago.

That's non-executive directors or Neds, as the white old jargon would have it.

They're meant to bring outside expertise to government departments,

but in Matt Hancock's case, one of his Neds was an old university friend and became his

lover, which sounds just a little bit like a conflict of interest. A new IFG report has crunched the

numbers on NEDs and has some crunchy recommendations too. We're going to talk to its author.

So joining me today in our studio is Alex Thomas, who leads our civil service work.

He used to work in the cabinet office as well. Hi, Alex. Hello, Bromyn.

Great to have you here. Tom Sass, IFG Associate Director and our resident expert on all things to do with COVID and science is here. Hi, Tom. us. And I'm delighted that we've also got with us, our senior fellow, Jill Rutter, whose versatility

in commenting on all aspects of government comes from years working there and for us. Hi, Jill.

Hello, Bronwyn. Great to have you here. Okay, let's kick off. Freedom Day, which Boris Johnson

spent in self-isolation after coming into close contact with Health Secretary Sagit Javid, who has COVID,

and so is also locked away at home.

So not a lot of freedom there. The Prime Minister beamed into our homes from Chequers,

which is not a terrible place to be forced to isolate, to tell us to embrace the lifting of

...